Last weekend ArtWranglers visited Bermagui to see what a non-juried, art-in-the-public-domain exhibition on the edge of the continent (literally, the Bermagui headland) and as far away as you can get from the cosmopolis – those big-city environments in which sculpture has been flourishing. This is public art on a shoestring, run by local enthusiast Jan Ireland and her team of volunteers, plus in-kind support from a raft of willing local businesses. And in this context “Sculpture on the Edge” is a bravely provocative title – click over to the Kelly Gang to read about some of the previous years’ controversies – and see below how artists like Phil Spellman and Hanna Hoyne responded to the challenge…

Why “brave”, why “provocative”? Art in the public domain (see our ongoing thread about Public Artefacts) raises challenging questions about art, (when is an object a work of art, when is it simply public decor?) as well as the questions about the ownership of public space, governments’ commitments to public arts policies, how they are promoted (and defended), who gets to decide what it is we bump into, and on what basis those decisions are being made. In this case, it’s brave because country town politics can be raw and interpersonal, and provocative because, basically, anything goes in a non-juried exhibition like this. It has some of the edginess of the Mildura Sculpture Prize of the 60s and 70s, without a Tim Burns’ minefield having to be steam-rollered by the local Council (which was probably the artist’s intent), and owes a lot to the Sydney “Sculpture by the Sea” which has done so much to elevate the profile of contemporary sculpture in Australia over the last decade. But yes, there has been censorship in the past (Richard Moffat’s abstract steel Knot was ordered removed last year because a member of the public thought it was a turd, and therefore a commentary on a controversial sewerage system) so it is brave of the organisers to continue to test the boundaries of public taste.

Where events like this (and Canberra’s Domain project) become really significant – in terms of the ways in which public are may be entertained, accepted, or rejected by both the public and government agencies – is the sense in which we encounter art which is relatively naked of the institutional frameworks which, effectively, tell us that it’s “art” we’re up against. What we like about these kinds of events is that they’re short-term, ephemeral, open, and that they invite the kind of social interaction which is so constrained in a museum context. If museum art is a secular religion, then events like “Sculpture on the Edge” is an entirely healthy form of social atheism.

But finding the edge, the boundary between art and non-art, is a century-old issue which still drives contemporary art’s evolutionary momentum. Take away the edginess, and we’re in the sleepy-time doldrums. So what was actually sitting on the edge in this event – what made it more than a country fair arts-and-crafts display?

ArtWranglers liked it best when the artists responded to the drama of the grassy headland topography. Hannah Hoyne’s Soulsearchanaut about to be Born an angelic astronaut in a bubble threatening to fly out over the bay, Amanda Stuart’s pack of wild dogs (Bush Pack) which terrorized the escarpment beyond the lawn, causing fright to local puppies and their owners, and Rachel Bowak who terrorized the grey nomads in the caravan park next door with Container, an installation in a container which suggests a last glimpse of earthly paradise before the euthenic or cryogenic solution to our mortal, rather than aesthetic, dilemmas.

But John Ramsey’s set of five giant Fishing Floats signals a neat response to the priorities of a fishing village like Bermagui. And everyone shares the drama of one of the floats escaping its tether out in the bay, and another being battered to pieces by the high tide. Art is made accessible through works like this and enables and encourages people to begin to make art, to become an artist, to get into the act. You can see Clayton’s Titanic Deck Chair half a kilometer away on Horseshoe Bay beach, where its scale confuses the viewer’s eye (but not the participatory intentions of a younger audience).

More than half the artists in this exhibition are artists by inclination, not by training or career trajectory. That’s its social value, and that’s why it’s worth supporting, and defending against philistine anxieties. Some of the artists who have started from scratch, like local sculptor Richard Moffat, now enjoy a booming practice, and participate in exhibitions and residencies all over the country.

Some participants even deny their assumed status as an artist! Ecowarrior Mark Frith well and truly put the boundaries of art to the test when he took his mobile sculpture Climate Change Express in Saturday’s Main Street parade and nearly lost it on the downhill stretch. Unusual in the artworld, Mark is happy to deny his artistic ego, seeing Sculpture on the Edge more as an opportunity for creative activism. But don’t dismiss his artistic modesty – the jury is still out on the peoples’ choice award!

Whether insider or outsider, amateur or professional, most of the sculptures, it must be said, treated the grassy headland as you would any garden setting, and therefore made more modest claims on their aesthetic impact. Some participants, like Beatle Collins, was busy building his latest (actually his second) work of art 30 minutes down the road in Marr Grounds’ bush sculpture park, and so his first work of art (click here for a look) was only represented in photographic form. How fast can eco-art adopt the look of conceptual art? At the other end of the spectrum, Ulan Murray is also thinking about the trees, in his work Eucalypt, in a way that neatly resolves the dilemma of the plinth in this outdoor gallery setting.

Who is an artist, or not, what is art, or not, what is a sculpture, or not, are not just issues which surface in a country town – they resonate wherever art escapes private or institutional spaces. More than any other art form, sculpture has the capacity to make people plain angry, when it’s in your face, in your way, when it disrupts your everyday life, when it seems too expensive, wasteful of materials, or disagreeable for any of a number of reasons…

So there’s a challenge for us to make the discourse around sculpture more accessible, and to draw out its special and distinctive potential – both its aesthetic potential, feeding back and influencing the course of art – and its social potential, in its interventions, animations, and its capacity to excite our social spaces. Governments and their agencies need to be on their toes, searching out the best advice and expertise, and having the nerve to let decisions be made that will resonate down the years.

So, what are the future prospects of Sculpture on the Edge? The region is full of artists, collectors and enthusiasts who see the event and one of the high points of their Easter Season – vide the continuing success of the Four Winds music festival. Organiser Jan Ireland mobilises significant in-kind support. Artists submit works from far and wide. But for the event to attract national attention, several more things need to happen: funding needs to increase to back the expertise of the organising network on a properly professional, (not charitable) basis; time and energy needs to be funded early each year to build a national profile, to attract and subsidise artists’ participation from beyond the region; and the potential for exhibition spaces could be expanded to integrate the urban environment with the park-like setting of the headland. But this requires expertise, time, energy, and professional support… To achieve significant sponsorship and patronage requires a base commitment to support expertise and or organisational skills – which is not at present forthcoming. Given these incentives, the quality of the event – and the quality of the art – could really take off.

Luckily, here in Canberra, the ghosts of Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahoney walk the streets, muttering incantations, ready to haunt those who dare to undermine the sacred purity of their design, and challenging their successors to rise above the mundane! But public spaces are never sacrosanct (see the Alexander Downer Nude for the nadir of public art in Canberra) and much more needs to be done to lift the standards of public debate.

Now click across to glasscentralcanberra and transit lane for more images and commentary…